Sunday, February 10, 2013

The Mayors of Winston-Salem

It is day 10 of the 30 minus 2 days of writing hosted by Nicky and Mike of We Work For Cheese. Today's prompt is "The Mayor". Visit Nicky's page to see what the other long-suffering participants have written.

Winston and Salem merged into Winston-Salem and was officially incorporated in 1913. Oscar Eaton was elected as the Mayor of Winston before the incorporation, and he served until 1917. Until then there were mayors for both Winston and Salem.

During Mayor Eaton's tenure, a lot was done to bring Winston-Salem into the 20th century such as the paving of First Street and the opening of the Salem Water Plant. Also the Public Works department was established, and in 1915 the first police cars were purchased.

During our official 100-year history, Winston-Salem has had 18 mayors. Of those 18, George Coan served two non-consecutive terms during 1929-1935 and 1943-1945. There were two who served one-year terms. R. J. Reynolds (I think you'll recognize that name) from 1941-1942, and J. Wilbur Crews from 1942-1943.There were two mayors who served for 12 years each, Marshall Kerfees 1949-1961 and Wayne Corpening, 1977-1989.The current mayor, Allen Joines has been in office since 2001. The majoral election is coming up later this year, and Joines is seeking a fourth term.

That was very interesting. Here in Canada we seem to have problems with mayors lately. For instance the mayors of Montreal and nearby Laval resigned until an investigation into corruption has been completed. The mayor of London, Ontario would appear to have spent taxpayers money on his son's wedding. And in Toronto, the mayor was removed from office but reinstated by a court over using city funds to support his coaching of a football team. It appears he now overspent during his election campaign to the tune of some $40k which is illegal.